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British Touring Car Championship
The British Touring Car Championship is an national touring car racing series organised by TOCA. It has had two incarnations, the first beginning in 1958 as the British Saloon Car Championship and the second will begin in 2008 after dissolution in 2003 The TOCA/TCTA Split In 1998, the governing body of the BTCC, TOCA, introduced a new entry process which increased the cost per season substantially. These changes priced out independent entries and lead to widespread discontent amongst the remaining manufacturers. In an effort to take on TOCA, the maufacturers banded together and formed the Touring Car Teams Association which effectivly unionised those teams committed to the championship against their governing body. In direct response to this, TOCA announced a series of financial reforms at the start of 1999 to restore entry fees to pre-1998 levels over the next couple of years. The split began forming over the 2002 pre-season when TOCA attempted to repeal the financial reforms and raise entry fee costs for the 2003 season. Once again the TCTA protested with several teams threatening to withdraw from the championship. However, unlike last time, TOCA refused to back down and the price increases were confirmed. This resulted in several works teams announcing the end of their programmes at the end of the 2002 season. Things continued to go from bad to worse as TOCA continued their policy of raising entry fees. This ended up with the remaining teams, including Alfa Romeo who had only joined at the start of the season, announcing their withdrawal at the end of the season. A majority jumped ship to the newly formed European Touring Car Championship with Vauxhall the exception joining the National Saloon Car Championship. This left TOCA with no entries for the 2004 season which was eventually cancelled and the championship dissolved. Reformation For many years after the dissolution there were attempts to revive the championship. As the it became clear that a TOCA run championship wouldn't be able to survive, the members of the TCTA met several times to in an attempt to establish a rival championship under their control. However, with the constituent manufacturers unable to come to a consensus, talks broke down. When it became clear the championship would not return in 2004, the NSCC looked at renaming their series to reflect their new found status as Britain's lead touring car series, but as TOCA still owned the rights to the name, these plans fell through. In the interim years, TOCA met with several manufacturers to gauge interest in a revived series. In mid-2005, Vauxhall proposed a series of new regulations, similar to Super 2000 but with more extreme bodywork, but with no other manufactures interested, the revival was shelved and the regulations were re-purposed for use in the NSCC. In winter 2006, talks became serious and eventually TOCA announced the series would return in 2008 running to Super 2000 regulations and with a 2 year commitment from 2 manufacturers. These were later revealed to be SEAT and Vauxhall with Alfa Romeo also committing to a manufacturer program. Eventually, an 18 car entry list was announced alongside a 12 round calendar. Champions |valign="top"| |}